Kristen is home for the 1st time since August 2006

Kristen came home Dec 17th after attending a Air Force Leadership course in San Angelo, TX for two weeks. Kristen wanted to surprise her mother by coming home. I picked her up at the airport here in Grand Junction. Renae was quite surprised. Roby and the kids were already over at the house waiting to see Kristen. After we got all the "how did" and why did" out of the way we went and ate at the Olive Garden. Kristen had been missing the salad, bread stick, soup lunch at Olive Garden. We spent probably an hour and half there because of bad service but it gave us time to catch up with what Kristen had been up to. Renae suggested we all go see Madagascar 2 at the Regal. So we all piled into the cars and headed to the movie palace. Katie crawled around the entire stadium, which we had to ourselves, while the rest of us watched the movie. Then we went back home and played some games with the kids.

Kristen and Roby having fun at the Olive Garden


Kristen, Renae, and Katie playing a game.

Renae and I both took off Thursday and got up around 5am. We cooked a quiche and when Kristen got up we all sat down to eat. Kristen had some shopping to do, so after all of us showering we got into my car and headed to the VA so Renae could put her leave in. Once done there Kristen needed to go to the DMV. This was an interesting little experience as her license was expired but since she is active duty military is just now renewing it. The lady initially told her she would have to take the test and driving test again, I started laughing, Kristen got this what the F... are you talking about look on her face then said again she was active duty military. The lady then said she has three years to renew her license once it expires. After we got done there we went to Sports Authority, Target, and Walmart. Whew what a day. We came back home and Kristen started wrapping presents then we came upstairs and made dipped pretzels, yummy goodness. We decided to get back in the car after making pretzels to see the lights. That was fun. Roby and Kristen then went out to eat and Renae and I conked.


Having fun dipping pretzels.


Kristen there is more white chocolate on your hands than the pretzels.

Friday I had to work so Kristen and Renae brought me to work as Roby still has Renae's car and we ate some of the quiche that we made. I spent some of the morning registering us for the Bataan Death March in March 2009. We all registered for the 15.2 memorial walk. Renae and Kristen were then going to do a little more shopping and pick me up for lunch. We went to Bocaza's for lunch (another really yummy eating place they don't have in Italy), then to Graff Dairy for ice cream. After work Renae and I went to Sams and Kristen took Roby's truck to go get some groceries for this weekend.

The weather has been off and on nasty but we are headed to Denver tomorrow, Saturday, to see Taysha. Kristen flys out on Sunday morning. And boy was it nasty. It had snowed another 3 inches in Grand Junction Friday night and the roads were pretty slick until we got out of Debeque Canyon. Roby was following us. We stopped in Eagle (customary) then Renae drove. The weather and roads started turning nasty again. Roby passed us at some point before Vail and everyone freaked out watching him fish tail all the way up Vail pass. We made a mandatory stop at Frisco Walmart to buy 240lbs of sand for the back of Roby's truck. Then we were off again. We finally got to Denver at 215pm 6 hours after we left Junction. We called Taysha and headed straight to the Elephant Bar. Taysha and Brian and his dad and sister also met us there. Then we headed to the hotel and Taysha's. We opened the presents that Kristen and Clayton got us all at Taysha's, headed to the mall so we could do a bit of shopping, then back to Taysha's and enjoyed watching people play the Wii game. I conked out around 9pm on Taysha's chair. I guess RJ called around 930pm and everyone talked with him. We finally got back to the hotel around 1030 only to turn on the TV and see that a plane had crashed at DIA. So now that everyone was totally freaked out because Kristen was to fly out the next day.

Kaleb opening his Nerf gun from Aunt Kristen.


Kristen and Taysha trying to open Katie's Dora doll.


Roby being cool.

I wasn't feeling well Saturday night so fell asleep pretty quickly. At one point I woke up to go to the bathroom and Kristen was cuddling a stuffed (toy) turkey it was cute. We all got up around 6am so we could be over at Taysha's by 7-715. We tried calling to let them know we were on the way but no one answered their phone. Taysha and Brian agreed to cook us breakfast, since no one answered their phone we thought they were all still sleeping but when we got there, TAYSHA WAS COOKING SAUSAGE. Holy Cow. We ate and then unloaded our car so we could fit all of Kristen's luggage in to take her to the airport. She checked three bags and carried on a back pack, pillow, can of three flavor popcorn, and something else. I think all of Denver happened to be out at the airport when we dropped her off. Renae and Kristen unloaded the car and got into the check in line at United, while I parked the car in short term parking (insane). Once I found them in the check-in line I sat down and waited for them to check the baggage. It was then 10am and Kristen's plane left at 1051 which meant we had 51 minutes to get her through security (there were maybe 50,000 people waiting to get through security) and to her gate. Luckily there was a line that crew members and active duty military could cut to the head of the line to security so it only took Kristen maybe 3 minutes to get through security. We said our final good byes and off we all went in our separate directions. We got back to Taysha's and loaded everyone up for the trip back to Junction. The ride back home was pretty uneventful other than the fact I had to wait for hot chocolate till we got to Dillon. It took us about 4 1/2 hours to get back with about 45 min stop for lunch in Dillon.

It was really good seeing Kristen again. She looks really good pregnant. Next time she will be home will be in March 09 when she PCS's back to the States. She will have a little baby and Clayton with her. Yeah.